


Phone Tag

by black_hat_with_bells



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: Dark fic, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-14
Updated: 2011-04-14
Packaged: 2017-10-18 02:30:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/184011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/black_hat_with_bells/pseuds/black_hat_with_bells
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sylar plays phone tag with Eden.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Phone Tag

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sinemoras09](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=sinemoras09).



> warning: unbeta'd

This mission had gone to hell.

Bennet—Noah—had promised Eden a second chance. If anything, she was the sterling reminder of why there had to be laws in the world, why there had to be the looming threat of death and permanent incarceration. When the rules didn’t apply, she had chosen to make her own world.

For the most part, she hadn’t harmed anyone…too badly. Except for that one time.

However, even speaking in this new lustrous way, she still couldn’t speak. So, she had experimented with things that would help her speak, break down all those old rigid laws of internal insecurities. For once, she had control. She could make people do anything she wanted them to.

Working hadn’t brought any good to her life before, and being quiet and perfect, hadn’t. She wanted to live, and moreover, she had wanted the world to know that she existed.

“Tell me that you love me,” she had ordered one nameless guy and the look on his face, the screaming contrast between his eyes and his lips—made her furious.

“Believe that you love me.”

She had broken his mind with that command, and she saw the snap herself.

Too late did she realize that her own world could only be inhabited by herself—and her alone.

Too late, did she realize that she didn’t care because by god, she was going to do it anyway.

It seemed like the only place she could believe, in this insular lie of mysterious clubs and dark streets where real feelings and sentiments didn’t apply.

Then he had found her. Given her a purpose. Eden knew that her power was especially threatening to them, an asp for her tongue or her heart. A few choice words could kill them all, and one word could make the Company hers if she wanted it badly.

Bennet was smart though; probably because he had to deal with people like them based on his own merits. A kind of ironic contrast to Papa Suresh’s theory of evolution. Maybe people like her were all de-evolving instead, their hidden sides bubbling to the surface with or without their consent.

One of them.

He knew that she’d be too afraid to go back to that life, too afraid of not being able to control herself.

It was bitter medicine to swallow, and she still hadn’t quite accepted it yet. However, she did like to think she had some ability to do good.

Only it was still a lie.

And her target had gone AWOL.

***

“Are you okay?”

Chandra looked haunted, furtively searching the dark corners of the hallway. The night sky outside only made it darker in the building where everyone existed behind closed doors in their own space, their own separate spheres.

This crowded building was pathetically lonely.

“I’m just a little unwell,” he answered through the door. She held the lunch she had prepared for him in her hands. Before, it had been the only sincere piece of herself she could offer him, mixing batters from scratch and spending hours on her feet checking it.

It remained untaken. The man looked sick.

“My work has taken much of my attention, Eden,” Chandra told her, his nod signaling finality to their conversation. “Please—I might not be up for entertaining anymore for the next few weeks. This isn’t a place for….this situation isn’t ideal for a young girl. Understand?”

His eyes.

“That’s all right. I can still bring food by though, you still have to take time to-.”

“I said no,” he said briskly and shut the door. She blinked and went to her apartment. She felt…nothing. Nothing really.

Throwing herself on her couch, she dialed Bennet, curious about the status of this thing.

“Eden,” he said, an edge of being haggard quite apparent in his calm.

“Hello to you too,” she teased, looking around her den. No books of her own, a TV donated to her, and that was pretty much it. “What happened?”

“Nothing worth mentioning.”

She knew he was cautious about talking on the phone, but Eden knew her phone was safe--she had ordered no one to listen to her line through her voice. That, she felt, solved her problem.

“Then something major,” she answered, her smile disappearing from her face. “I should know. I need to know to be able to react if he comes here.”

“I doubt he will.”

“Well, where is he?”

“We were unable to bag him. I found the evidence, but…my partner interfered at the moment we were supposed to make the pick-up.”

So. He was just out there now?

“How did you find evidence?” she asked. “We couldn’t find any trace of the body before.”

“I may have made a slight misjudgment.”

She waited, listening.

“My daughter is off that list, correct?”

“Yes, she’s off the list,” Eden reassured him. “I’ve checked again, and Papa Suresh had deleted the records of her in his computer too.”

“All right. All right,” he said, more to himself than her. “You can leave the area now. It should be secure. He’d be an idiot to go back there again.”

Eden disagreed. Being forced out of a place—your place, your life—made you cast around for certain attachments. Noah hadn’t seen how Gabriel was around Chandra. The air had always felt tense when she was in the room; sibling rivalry came to mind. He wanted Chandra’s attention all to himself.

She was reminded of the time she told the doctor a short story about how she had caught fireflies as a child. He had laughed, delighted, but Gabriel had deadpanned with a ‘wow’, his lips curved up cruelly as if she was the smallest, most pathetic thing he had ever seen.

Gray made it impossible to be in the room for too long, deliberately drawing out long silences to force her out.

He’d come back here: of this, she was sure.

“I’d rather stay a little longer. If I could.”

“Why?” Bennet asked, impatient over the static of his phone.

“I like the freedom.”

“No, you like this cage better.”

She recoiled. “What?”

“I apologize,” Bennet said, sighing. “We all have our cages. It’s not singular to you, and I didn’t mean to imply that. But we’ll contact Suresh later and offer him-.”

“He’s very much alone here. Completely isolated,” Eden said and waited.

“…For a few more days, sure. Won’t hurt. Won’t help but won’t hurt,” Bennet said and hung up.

She glared at the phone for a few minutes before stretching out and resisting the old temptation of curling her hair with her fingers—couldn’t do that anymore, her long mane having been trimmed to something more….docile, she supposed.

At least her appearance had been more honest before.

The building was quiet. She sat there, thinking of what she could do to help Suresh, when the phone rang again. She picked it up, still sore at Bennet’s arrogance—and afraid he had changed his mind.

“Yes?” she asked, her tone already on the defensive.

“Hello.”

She sucked back in her breath. Pulling the phone away from her face, she checked the number—he must be calling from a payphone. She put it back up to her ear, her heart pounding.

“Do you know who this is?” he asked, amused. Darkly so. His voice—it was like coming out of a tunnel. Before, it had been small and unsure like a mouse scurrying around in daylight—now it was deep, smooth. A force of its own.

“Mr. Gray?”

“That would be my father. Who am I?”

“Gabriel,” she whispered, getting up to look through her blinds.

He didn’t say anything for a few moments, and she heard something large pass through the air by him, a car…something bigger.

“Uh, hi. I’ve got to say, didn’t expect have you call me. Do you need to talk to-.”

“I want to talk to you. The little college girl.”

She would have laughed, but his tone was so strange that she couldn't.

“Okay. So talk.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask you something. It kept slipping my mind, and this might be the last time I can ask.”

“All right,” she challenged.

“Why don’t you have any pictures in your room?”

She resisted the urge to look out her blinds again.

“I saw inside your room one time, when the door was open…” he said, after making her twitch in anxiety.

“Don’t have any good frames for them.”

He chuckled. “Of course. It wouldn’t be that you don’t have any friends.”

“Where are you, Gabriel? We could be talking about all these lovely things face-to-face.”

“I don’t think you’d like that.”

“You’re right. I’d rather be talking about something else face-to-face.”

“Such as?”

“Why you’re being so mysterious? Come on. Where are you?”

“I can’t go home.”

Eden remembered her cover. “Can’t get on the train? Look, I can get a cab and drive to where you are. We could get some coffee.”

“Can you do me a favor?”

She paused, her eyes flickering with unease. “Depends on what it is.”

“Smart girl. It’s very simple…” He hesitated, seeming to falter.

“Well?”

“Can you check on my mother for me? I’m going to be out of town on business for a few weeks. I’ll give you her address, and you can just knock on her door, see if she’s okay.”

“Your mom?” At the word, the ghost of her own mother rose up. “You can’t call her yourself?”

Silence.

She looked at the clock. Knew that she should be finding some way to contact Bennet. Knew he’d never get any opportunity to make peace with his mom… “Okay, I can do that. Sure.”

“Give me your cell phone number. I want to hear her voice.”

Demanding. Entitled. Possibly…something more awful. To hear them spin it: something evil.

And she gave her number to him, anyway.

***

It didn’t take Gabriel long to call her back as she walked the street towards his mother’s address.

Realistically, it was safer to talk on her cell phone—she had spoken a command to not be listened to by whomever surely was.

She had to take the subway to reach that side of town and got washed out the sliding doors with the crowd. Her phone rang and she flipped it open, having held it the entire ride in her hands. Worrying over it.

“You know, it just occurred to me that it’s not a safe hour for little girls to be wandering around alone.”

Eden fought the shudder that threatened to run up and down her spine, fought to keep herself from turning around to search the sea of people. It was late. Dark, the subway all human sweat and indifference—

He could reach out and touch her if he wanted to.

“Good thing I’m not a little girl,” she said.

She could feel his smile on the other end of the line, as strained as it also felt. Eden knocked on the door and saw the small woman, wrapped in a small blanket, peer through the crack.

“Hi? I just moved in today, and wondered… Is this the Ellis’?”

“You have the wrong address.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Well, I was asleep.” And with that, the door was shut. He laughed.

“Don’t mind her. She doesn’t mean it like that.”

“Was that okay?” Eden asked him softly.

“It was enough. Why the ‘move-in’ addition?”

“Well,” she said, at a loss. “I didn’t know if you’d need me to check again. I don’t want to come across as a creepy stalker of older women, do I?”

“I guess not,” he admitted—again with a hint of amusement. “I can call you again?”

“Anytime, but-.”

She couldn’t her words out before the line clicked dead.

***

A week went by.

Eden didn’t dare leave what she now considered to be her post. Chandra didn’t come out of his apartment often. She would look through the peephole and see light streaming under his door at all times of night.

Since the first call, she’d had two more. He had hung up both times, his breath catching as if he wanted to say something that couldn’t be put into words. Then the line would click, and Eden couldn’t speak—or speak—quickly enough.

She didn’t leave her apartment much either, keeping the phone charged at all times. Eden didn’t tell Bennet about her impromptu phone call. He didn’t ask.

Well, she didn’t want to admit she hadn’t gotten the chance to make him come back. Or that for some reason, she felt sorry for him right now, even when he had seemed like a mean-spirited, elitist guy before.

She didn’t know but she guessed this was like her second chance. A chance to help someone who was like her without using her voice…

And maybe they’d make the choice of their own freewill. Some part of her needed this proof, this reaffirmation.

So, she kept the phone at her bedside table.

The call came in the morning and she almost missed it, scrambling for the device through the darkness and her covers.

She looked at the number, and it was different. He must be using a disposable phone. She just knew it was him.

“Gabriel,” she choked out, through the veil of sleep. “Don’t hang up.”

It wasn’t a true command but the sound of the radio made it clear she had gotten through to him. Now what?

“I wasn’t going to,” he said. A mix of ‘you couldn’t have stopped me anyway’ and ‘how dare you imply that?’

“Good,” she muttered, getting up out of bed to get some coffee. “It’s three o’ clock.”

“I noticed. You did say any time, and well…”

“It’s okay,” she said, her head hurting at the hour.

“It’s peaceful out here, on the road. Not a soul is out here.”

“You're the only one left awake,” she joked. “Actually, how are you awake?”

“…Just barely,” he admitted.

“That’s not safe, driving half-awake.”

“I’ll risk it.”

Eden sat at her kitchen table, trying to find her words. “When are you coming back?”

“Aren’t college students supposed to be up? Burning the midnight oil?” he asked, ignoring her question.

“Not when you plan ahead,” she said, going with his sudden change.

“What’s your degree? I realize I never asked you.”

“It’s Communications,” she said, the irony appealing to her. “And you never asked me a lot of things. You didn’t talk to me much, you know.”

“Hmm. Don’t people do that naturally without studying it? Communicate?”

“Some better than others.”

Gabriel stopped in mid-speech. There was just the hum of the engine for a moment. “I walked right into that, didn’t I?”

“Kinda, yeah,” Eden said, moving her cup around on the table. “Like I said, we didn’t do much of it, either.”

“Why?”

“Are you really asking for a sincere answer?”

“I believe I did, communications major,” he said.

“You didn’t seem like you wanted to talk.” He didn’t interrupt, so she continued. “You were dismissive.”

“Really?” he muttered, as if this was news to him.

“No one told you that before?”

“No. They didn’t bother to get that far.”

Eden waited, unsure. “What kind of food does your mom like?”

He didn’t answer, and she thought he had hung up until….“What’s it to you?”

“I wanted to bring something to her tomorrow. If that’s all right with you.”

“I…”

When the line clicked off, she wanted to kick herself.

***

“Tell me about yourself, Eden,” was the order from the next call at two in the morning after a space of three days.

“Subtle.”

“I can’t help it. There’s nothing even remotely interesting on the TV right now. So.”

“And charming too,” Eden said, rubbing her eyes. “Go pay-per-view.”

“That selection is worse. And one selection is just stupid.”

“You’re right. They have hotlines for that.”

“…Crude.”

She stretched and looked through her blinds, just in case. “Hey, you called me.”

“It’s better than having a conversation with myself. I have a feeling that’d get pretty predictable after awhile.”

She didn’t want to laugh. There was nothing funny about this situation: it might have been either laugh, or spill. Cry. Something like that. She had never had anyone rely on her like this.

If that’s what he was doing. Eden couldn’t know for sure. It just felt like what she should be doing: something that was hers. She had to admit there was freedom in speaking to someone that…well, no one would believe. This calling, this back-and-forth, seemed like it was just between them.

(she did not just think that)

“There’s not much to tell, about me," Eden said.

No one’s asked, not even the Company beyond the bare, judgmental essentials. This was a first.

“Now, we both know that’s not true. Do I have to cross-reference that name…Ellis?”

Her heart stopped, and she had to lick her lips—twice—before she could muster up an answer.

“Uh, my fake pseudo-name? Oh you’d get far with that—though it might be more interesting.”

“It could be fictional. But it’s familiar to you. People usually say the first name that they have the most experience with; it’s on the top of their minds. No matter what, it’d tell me something about you.”

“That’s creepy.”

“Don’t be too hard on yourself,” he retorted sarcastically. She didn’t… “Listen. Just say anything. No more pretense.”

“It’s my birthday in a few weeks.”

“Wow.”

Eden rolled her eyes. “Don’t sound so excited. I’m not planning on celebrating it.”

At this, there was a longer silence, and god help her, she heard voices pass by him. Through a window. Sounded like a family.

“Do I really have to ask? You threw that out there on pure calculation," he said.

“Force of habit. I don’t celebrate it. Nothing really…I think I have an allergy to holidays.”

“Bad family life.”

She sighed. “An okay family life. Not enough of one to really call good or bad.” She was wielding a sword with her words, making a power play. But it was a double-edged sword.

Eden saw herself as that little girl in jeans and that stupid ponytail (she remembered the time her…time of the month had come and the horror that had happened later, with her stepmother cussing at her…)—and the first thing she did out was become a woman, adhering strictly to her mental image of a real woman (of raw femininity).

There was the sex, the outfits, the lifestyle without rules, and the power.

She had been outside of her body, watching herself with painted up full lips and dark eyes, barely there tops. She wanted to be worshipped for that body, trying to show off, enhance—be.

“Inside or out?”

“….what are we talking about here?” she asked, jolted out of her thoughts.

“Did they keep you in, or did they kick you out?”

“Inside, then. I guess.”

“Ah. Then you went wild when they finally let you out.”

She wrapped her arms around her knees. “You surprise me.”

“Good."

“You didn’t seem to have a lot of street smarts when I met you. Common sense, you know," she said.

He inhaled for a moment, held it, and then let out a shaky laugh. A deeply offended one. “Right. I’m so concerned that I don’t meet your criteria. I guess I should be looking for any common thing, huh? Better than being special.”

She didn’t follow: then she did. Had to pretend she was still lost in the woods.

“There’s only so long you can go without being in the real world,” she continued on. “Relating, surviving. I didn’t want to be out there so early, but even my home life was an exercise in survival, endurance.”

“I’ll adapt. It’s what I do.”

“Some things, skills, are unattainable. Once they are gone, that’s it.”

“But I read you very well. The simple fact that you dislike me makes this work for you, makes you think you’re being a truly good person. You like the idea that I need you, so in turn, you wait by the phone all day and answer on the first ring.”

It was her turn to gasp.

“And now you’ll wait for about ten rings before answering in an aloof voice. But I don’t need you. I don’t care about you. This is amusing to me, is all, that you like the attention I choose to give you. You’re amusing to me," he said.

“Then don’t call me if—just don’t call me.”

“I know your social life has suffered over this: so, as you wish. Goodbye, Eden.”

He hung up, and she saw red. Her eyes hurt and pounded, and she heard the metal frame of the phone click a little in her tightening grip. She threw the phone across the room and went to make herself a drink.

***

He lasted longer, no calls coming in for a space of two weeks.

The Company was going nuts, listening to the growing silence and peace with dread. Chandra still wandered around with his head bowed and jacket collars to his ears.

And she certainly didn’t want to think about how she had told the person they were supposed to be tracking to never call her again—brilliant move. That wouldn’t improve her warranty with this Company (family).

In a fit of pique, Eden went over to Ms. Gray’s with her best dish. After a few moments of playing a very awkward social game, she was through the door, the woman in question looking amazed at the plate of food. Inside, it seemed like a trip into the past, more like a grandmother’s home of some sort or a small museum. Not with the times at all, and it reminded her of Gabriel.

Of stubborn nonconformity, in an initially gentle wrapping. Seemed unreal, like it was covering up something.

“I didn’t expect...in this day and age. This is very thoughtful of you," Ms. Gray cooed.

“It’s no trouble, I just made a little too much and wanted to share," she said.

“Waste not, want not. That is an admirable quality. Most people are completely gluttonous and would have thrown this down the drain. Not deserving of it at all.”

Eden looked around at the mantle where there were pictures of him. As a child. If the reports that were starting to trickle in were true, it didn’t do her any good to think of him as a child once. But the evidence was there, and his smile from the photograph looked almost sweet…

It was sweet.

“Please sit down. Oh no, not there!” Eden got up quickly from the couch, biting her lip. “I’ll set the table. That’s my son, by the way. Those pictures. Wasn’t he the most adorable boy?”

“He was very cute,” Eden agreed.

“Oh, you should see him now. Are you married?”

Whoa, boundaries.

“I’m not, ma’am," Eden said.

“Oh. I wonder why a sweet girl like you isn’t?”

Eden shrugged in a feigned helplessness, feeling a sudden and unknown bitterness raise its head, and sat down at the table.

“I married young. I wouldn’t have changed it for the world, but…sometimes I wonder what I could have done. It wasn’t perfect, but we kept trying till we had our miracle.”

She was a little confused as to what that would be—until she followed the gaze to the mantle again. “He means a lot to you. I can tell.”

The woman paused in her motions to get the plates, and then looked down. “It almost scares me sometimes, how much he does mean to me.”

Eden smiled, unsure because the fervor behind her voice--. “I’m Sarah, by the way.”

Because Eden didn’t seem like the right name to use in this home. She didn’t want the usually treasured reaction to her original and self-made name. It didn’t seem like playing fair, all of the sudden, and she was ashamed for using it on Chandra as well.

She didn’t mind the lie to him, of course, but these two…

“Virginia. Sarah is a very pretty name. Thank you for coming over. It’s very lonely here at night.”

Afterwards, knowing she’d be roped in for a repeat performance by ‘lonely’ and more to the point ‘we should do this again’, she felt good about what she had done. In Gabriel’s words, it would seem like a selfish lie, but then she figured it didn’t matter because she had done the best that she could do.

For once, that was enough.

The next day, she did leave her post and go to the local university to wander around the grounds. Out of place completely. Not physically but in essence. Sarah had stayed in the cardboard box, voiceless with pruned hands smelling of dishwater soap (she was the definition of dishwater) and Eden had gone to the most dangerous dens of human existence.

Somehow, she didn’t think many had both those extremes to such a degree, let alone one extreme. She watched them talk in groups, the students, and laugh in the daylight. Read together, take pictures, put their arms around each other…

She couldn’t begin to imagine what they’d be talking about. There wasn’t a remote reference for it in her mind or heart. It wasn’t as if she could talk the knowledge into her head.

Some things are unattainable.

***

The end of the second week Eden got a package in the mail.

The address was sketchy, sent from nowhere—but she got a camera.

Along with some pictures frames.

***

The call came in at midnight.

Right on the cusp of Eden believing that she didn’t want to do this anymore.

“Cats,” she blurted out on the line.

“I’m not really fond of it.”

“What?”

“The musical?" He sighed. "Never mind.”

“I meant the frame. Why cats?”

“Seemed like you. Would I be wrong?” he asked. Playing with her.

Eden could hear leaves crunching under his feet. She calmed down, closed her eyes. “No. I loved it.”

A smug silence.

“I don’t think I can say thank you yet though. I don’t even know if I should accept it.”

“Let’s keep such trivialities out of this exchange. And of course you can accept it. One of your first gifts, after all. I am the only one who’s ever given you something, aren’t I?”

“In a very long time. My mother gave me a music box once.”

“Close enough. That’s what mother’s are supposed to do, give gifts.”

“Not always.”

“What about the camera? You liked that too?”

“Yes. It was wonderful.” And she had, though she couldn’t accept it from him.

“I think you should use it when you start college.”

“Start?”

“You’re not a college student,” Gabriel said with such confidence that her breath caught at first.

“Whatever you say, Gab-.”

“No. You’re not. Isn’t anybody honest anymore?” he asked, teasing, but Eden felt a gulf between them widen again.

“If you’re anybody, sure. But if you’re nobody—what was I supposed to do? Be proud of doing, of being nothing?" Eden asked.

And there, she had blown it, had shown her face. She prepared to drag him back, to deny him the choice of a second thought.

“You lied to impress him, didn’t you? The good doctor.”

“Not as much him as any member of the general population that I met, but it didn’t hurt, no.”

“He’s not worth the trouble.” His brusque tone made her blink. “I know much more than he ever would. Besides the fact that he’s not a good man, Eden. You should stay away from him.”

“How would you know? He’s alone and not taken seriously, he lost his daughter-.”

“He’s not a good person. Trust me.”

Her eyes shifted to the door, to across the hall in thought. Sounds of the night were all around him—

“He had a child involved in his research. Did you know?”

“No," she said.

“You really shouldn’t get attached to him. He’s not worth a lie or the truth.”

“And yet you were always around him.”

“I thought he was helping me. At first. Then I decided to learn as much as I could. As you should.”

“Uh-,” she began, about to point out his contradiction.

“I didn’t mean the good doctor. I was referring to your education. Goals. Dreams, to be cliché. Everyone has something that they want.”

“I couldn’t really accomplish much,” Eden admitted, looking at her hands. It was twelve thirty now. What was he doing?

“Sure you could. You’re capable enough for certain things, right?”

“No. No,” she said, biting her lip. Bennet’s words about cages came back to haunt her, there and then.

“Why-.”

“I messed up. Fucked up. I made too many mistakes for anything good to happen to me now.” It burst out of her, raw and jagged, scratching her throat on the way up. She put a shaking hand to her face, to make this confession not feel so alone.

“Ah,” he whispered. An epiphany.

“I’m going to get some sleep now. If I were you, I’d get my head on straight before it’s too late. Because it will be, someday.”

“Night, Eden,” he answered lightly, as if her last statement hadn’t taken place.

She didn’t sleep once.

That had become the norm.

***

“What holiday?”

This was new. He was calling during the day. Eden had been walking along the crowded streets to clear her head: as usual, there were the mixed feelings of wonder at how little people truly knew and a bit of envy at exactly how little they did.

She was almost grateful for his call, at the hour. It was like being thrown a rope. Eden wondered a bit if this was a sign that things had changed between them.

“Are you…chewing on something?” she asked.

He sighed. “I’m in a bad mood. This cook—using the term as lightly as possible, I won’t call him a chief—burnt my toast. There are spots on the silverware, the napkins aren’t folded right, and the table is sticky.”

“You might want to keep your voice down.”

“Why should I? I think this is pathetic.”

“Just an idea? But burnt toast isn’t the worst case scenario on the open road.”

He got quiet suddenly in realization.

“Oh," he said, in a softer voice.

“Right. But do go on. There’s more you want to say, I’m sure.”

“Naturally. I’ve had detour after detour, and an almost head-on collision—not my fault, by the way. A dog almost bit me. And the most insipid, stupid talk has been on the radio for weeks. I could do better than that, you know. I have a headache, and my chest hurts.”

“Aw.”

“Not in a sentimental way. The physical way.”

“You haven’t been sleeping. I’d know.”

“Try sleeping in those places. Do you know what people do in those places? The walls are paper thin, and last night, on the off chance that no one was doing anything else, the guy snored. Sounded like a freight train coming through my room. So, what holiday?” he continued, after he had had his rant. “Theoretically, if you liked holidays, what would be your favorite?”

“Halloween,” she said, ducking into a Starbucks. “It’s a fun time. Candy, being spooked out, the costumes.”

“Pagan, isn’t it?”

She laughed. “So is Christmas.”

“I know. The tree. But I still liked my tree.”

“You didn’t celebrate Halloween, did you?”

She needed something sweet to off-set the irony and quickly gave her order to the guy behind the counter.

“My mother hated it. Thought it was evil.”

“But Christmas was okay. Was that your favorite holiday?”

“Sometimes. If I had to choice, I’d be partial to it. The idea of it. But suicide rates go up on holidays.”

“Jeez. Thanks. So, why the day hour call? Just to vent? I had been suspecting you’re Dracula in disguise or something.”

“Or something,” he muttered. “I thought I should get an afternoon call in while I could. You’re going to be busy soon enough.”

The blood in her veins turned to ice. He knew.

“This is news to me," she said.

“You’re going to school.”

She let out a breath.

“Uh-huh. This really is news to me. Does your crystal ball also give the winning lotto numbers?”

“The first mask you wore is that of a college student. That tells me you think it’s respectable, a worthwhile endeavor, but something out of your reach. It’s what you want.”

“I don’t know. I didn’t put…that much thought into it when I said it.”

“All the better.”

She sat by the window, a half-smile on her face.

“I told you that was pretty much impossible. Most possibilities are just that for me. Not possibilities.”

“What did you do? Before?”

Eden traced a circle onto her own slightly sticky table. The world marched by the window.

“Think of a common phrase but leave out the rock n’ roll part,” she said bitterly.

“Hm,” was all he offered.

“Glad you feel so high and mighty now. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?”

“There are worse burdens to have on your shoulders than that.”

Not like she had killed anybody. Only that time. All her commands were true because she meant it from her heart. She wanted to tell him, desperately, but of course—he was the worse off.

Suddenly her coffee tasted stale, and the full realization of the situation hit her.

“Gabriel-.”

“Let me guess. You dropped out of high school.”

“That’s one way of saying it.”

“You can take your G.E.D.”

“That’s great. All warm and fuzzy. But I’d need some money, and I don’t plan on becoming a bank robber.”

Just a petty thief with the voice of God. She blinked, feeling small.

“Speaking of the spirit of giving, that’s what I was…I did have a college fund. I was frugal, but for reasons—several good ones—I chose not to pursue it. I was frugal for several years later, waiting for something…epic. And now that situation’s not in the cards. Ever. So, that money is just lying there, being unused and wasted.

I don’t like that.”

“You’re kidding,” she said, stuck dumb.

“I’m deadly serious,” he said, slightly mocking. “I don’t need those sorts of material things anymore. My destiny is paved before me. My own personal spear of destiny. Only I can do what is necessary. The world has need of me. Now I’m above the system. You aren't. The money is yours. No strings attached.”

“I…I couldn’t take that. I wouldn’t know where to start. I’d just…backslide again.”

“Someone’s got you under their thumb. Gave you a nice apartment to rot in. A well-furnished coffin. If you misbehave, they’ll yank the rug out from under you.”

It was like picking off a scab, the wound bled thick. “I’m—I made mistakes. I’m lucky to get a second chance.”

“The mistakes are the bars. The thorns. I was raised a Catholic, I know a thing or two about the concept of atonement. This generous patron of yours, are they using you?”

She swallowed hard. “No. No they aren’t...only by my choice, I mean.”

“People will take from you if you let them.”

“Look, I’m stabilizing. I’m aware for the first time in years, I’m trying to find-.”

“A purpose.”

“Yes, okay. So you can just forget it. Thanks but no thanks, as my life is finally making sense. I finally know why I'm on this planet!”

“It won’t work if you do it for someone else.”

To the mark. His words cracked through the armor, not because it was a lie. Truth. It was the truth.

“The person just fills the void of the addiction. The void that’s in you. The little thrill you get when you please them—you’d do anything for them. Them and only them. You expect the same level of—only, of giving—but they’re human, and it all falls apart. They’re just human underneath…Other things.”

“You say human like it’s disgusting,” and she realized her voice is thick, mangled with a thrush of tears. “God.”

She covered her eyes; the sun was too hot through the window to be borne but she made herself sit there.

“You said that past a certain point, it’d be too late to be in the real world. You remember?”

Her hands are shaking.

“Of course I do,” she forced out.

“You're not too far gone. Your mistakes, your bars to break.”

“How?”

“Don’t treasure your mistakes. Don't let them define you.”

“I’m not. Very often— they were stupid," she said.

Though she had liked it. How did a potential murderer sound so wise?

“Allow yourself to move on. Don’t be scared of yourself anymore. The fact that you feel guilty is more than enough.”

She did. She did feel so terrible. Her head hurt.

“Then you can find yourself through real experiences. Make some friends, go to the movies, and master a subject. Find someone…I don’t know. Just no more fronts. On your own two feet; as you know, my contribution won’t last forever. But by then, you can-.”

“I’m not capable.”

“Eden…”

“I’m not. You act like you know me. You don’t. I’d never make it without—I’d never make it clean," she said.

She hated how weak she sounded. Hated it. Hated her own weakness. She imagined a simple conversation with one of those people. The moment it went south, she’d speak. She’d crack. She realized how much harm her power could do. She could run the government to her will, if she wanted.

(she had wanted her to die. It had been her nursery rhyme, her dearest wish, her lullaby—her prayer. If she had a chance to do it again, she didn’t know the answer. Didn’t want to. That was a horror, to see a person die in front of you. Life knocked out of them by-)

Once gone.

There were others so dangerous. Technopathy could rule the world, too. Mind-control. Nuclear power.

Their kind—she’d crack. She was too dangerous to be with others, too harmful—the drugs had been her harness, her numbness, because she could—with all her anger and rage from crying in a closet as a girl--speak with the whole world to listen…

There was always the temptation. That’s why she had believed what Bennet was doing was right.

“Do you want to backslide?”

“No,” she whispered, sincerely. Feeling the wetness on her cheeks. “I don’t want to be that anymore. I don’t. I want to be a person. I want to rejoin the human race.

I don’t want to be toxic to anyone anymore.”

“Then you won’t,” he said simply. “You won’t.”

She wet her lips, her heart pounded. It seemed like forever that she just held her head in her hand, not listening to him, to anyone. It was too heavy to say…thank you. He didn’t know the circumstances, but suddenly—she thought he was right.

Knew that he was right.

She’d own her power, it wouldn’t own her. Her mind wouldn’t trap her.

And if she didn’t want to, she wouldn’t.

“Tell me where to send the money while I’m still able to send it at all.”

The following click was like a bucket of cold water.

***

“I don’t want you to speak. I’m not in the mood for idle talk. I just want you to stay on the line.”

Eden caught her breath. She had wandered tonight. Here and there. Not wanting to be alone in her room. She had walked by a church a few times. Decided against going in. She wanted her mistakes to be her own. She realized that part of her now, the possessiveness of her darker side—it was all she had of her own.

Eden wasn’t ready for anything else. Least of all at the lonely four AM hour where she always managed to find blinking streetlights and empty spaces.

This was her form of atonement.

“Okay, let me know you’re listening first, and then be quiet,” he said, and she could hear the eye-roll through his locked-tight voice. “Let me know you’re here.”

“I’m here, Gabriel.”

For the past couple of hours, she had wanted to tell him everything. She had wanted to make him come back—understand that he didn’t have to do this.

But the Company wouldn’t be merciful to him. She understood about control and power. It’d be almost impossible to stop. Almost.

She listened to the background noise of traffic. She looked up at the darkened sky. This wasn’t fair.

“He made a mistake.”

Not daring to ask, to break the request, she waited.

“She wasn’t special…he marked it wrong. How could he have done that?”

A bolt of horror flew through her—she sat there in shock.

“I don’t know what to do about this,” he muttered. “It’s not my fault. I would have interpreted the information correctly, if it had been me, but I don’t know what to do.”

She began to talk, hearing herself distantly. “Stop whatever this is. Come back. You don’t have to be alone anymore.”

She could right now. She could speak and make him never kill again, her command gridlocked in his brain for the rest of her life.

Torn, she considered actually doing it.

“I thought I told you not to talk,” he said, with painful coldness.

“I want to see you again.”

It was the most feeling she had put into any sentence, barring that voice, and she wrapped her arms around herself, managing to hold her phone while she was shaking again.

“You do.”

Not a question. She teetered, about to tell him all the good he could do. All the good she knew he could do.

“Poor girl.”

And she didn’t get the chance to say her peace.

***

In the days of silence, Eden had begun to have dreams.

They should have, by all rights, been nightmares. He’d come up behind her, stalk her—have her at a disadvantage. If he got her power, he’d destroy the world. He wouldn’t be able to control himself.

Some part of her thought it’d be funny—he’d never know a true word again. The majority of her, however, fought against the idea. Gabriel obtaining her power could not—would not—happen.

But instead of being afraid, she’d kiss him.

Or in her waking moments, she’d wished things had gone differently between her and Gabriel.

She wondered what might have happened if she had reached out to him.

She tortured herself on what could have been saved. She’d imagine taking back the holidays with him, taking back the moments they had both missed. She imagined a fork in the road of life which began and ended with her living with him.

Being human with him.

It was driving her crazy, she knew it.

***

“Have you ever been in love, Eden?”

She curled her legs up underneath her on the couch, remembering that she was powerful and could make him throw himself into any traffic nearby. Her first thoughts had been to correct him on the subject of her being a ‘poor girl’ (and what a mistake that would be) but his introduction had knocked all thoughts from her mind.

“That’s a bit personal, don’t you think?”

“I do," he answered.

A clock went off in the background, and unlike most places, this background sounded calm, lulling. Familiar, though not to her specifically— he was at a home.

It couldn’t be.

“No. Not really,” she admitted. She left out the fact that she might be falling in love with him. “I could never get past a certain level of acquaintance. What about you?”

“I thought I was once.”

“Tell me more about that?” Eden asked, curious.

“That’s not much to it. I believed her, trusted her implicitly. It occurs to me now I didn’t ask after her family, her relationships, her background, because I wanted her all to myself. That’s how it happened. I wanted her to be made for me, just for me. To love me and only me. That’s not entirely out of the cards. One way or another, in the end, she will be all mine.”

“I’m no expert but I don’t think it works like that way.”

“Well, you’re not even a novice at it yet,” he shot back calmly (on the edge of his anger again).

“I’ve loved. In general,” she protested in defense of her humanity.

“Like Suresh. You care for him, don’t you?”

“He’s the only one in as long as I can remember,” she confessed. “I know you don’t like him, but-.”

“What I think has nothing to do with your feelings. If your feelings are truly unconditional. That’s what I’ve found out, none of these treasured ideals are like the Bible verses. Selfless, I mean Most emotions are purely conditional, primarily selfish. No one ever does something without an ulterior motive. Nothing is ever really…enough, it seems to me.”

And she felt a vicious stab of guilt over her own reasons for helping him.

“You know, though, you—I think you’re right,” she decided to say. “You could do a lot of good for the world, with how much you know.”

“I don’t know…about that.”

Now his voice had taken on a distracted tone, and Eden frowned. She opened her mouth to ask what on Earth he was doing-

“Shh. Do you mind, I’m on the phone,” he hissed at someone, and she heard a muffled groan, and…

She covered her mouth with her hand, holding in a scream.

“I do know I love to work with my hands,” he said.

“Gabriel," she gasped.

“My ‘someday’ is today, Eden. It’s too late for me.”

That’s as honest as he ever was with her, even with the hint of defiant pride there. There was still…remorse. Yes, it was there, even though she wanted to run away from this, was ill.

“No.” She fought past the bile in her throat. “It’s never too late for anyone. It's harder to resist temptation...it's more unique not to give in to-”

“Got it. Done. You were saying?”

“It’s not too late for you,” she hissed. “I want to help. Let me help.”

“…You’re still here?” he asked, as if just realizing this fact.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m still here,” she breathed out, running a hand through her hair. She couldn’t believe this fact herself. Her knees were like jello.

He was quiet and the clock went off again.

“I think I’ve done something…I’m already tired,” he started and then trailed off. “Have I helped you? Have I done some good for you?”

“You have, you have so much,” Eden said. Almost against her will.

“And you’d be there for me?” he whispered in disbelief.

“Yes. Absolutely, I will be.”

“No matter what I do?”

“Of course,” she said, pleading.

“We’ll see.”

After the call ended, she was sick.

***

“For what I paid for this building, I’m not surprised. I knew this set-up was a little too good to be true!”

The lights in the apartment building had gone out at once; had flickered as one and had died as one, the air conditioner limping along after.

People were in the halls, complaining and knocking on each other’s door.

“Has your refrigerator gone off? Mine has too; I just went to the store. Someone’s going to have to pay for those spoiled groceries.”

Eden crossed the hallway to knock on her friend’s door. “Papa Suresh? Are you all right in there?”

“I’m quite well,” he answered back. Too quickly for him to be casually waiting inside. “This isn’t American efficiency, isn’t it?”

“I’d say not. Uh, I’ll come by later. To check on you.”

He opened the door a smidge and she saw something metallic and silver in his hand. Her breath caught. “No need. I’m prepared for anything.”

She nodded through a smile and started to look around. The residents were wandering around in under the red emergency lights, and the effect was surreal. Her heart started to pound—what was he going to do to her?

The ‘We’ll see’ had haunted her steps, and she had to struggle to swallow an obstruction in her throat. She was made up of nerves.

“Look. Outside!”

Before she could register what she was seeing, the sirens were soon wailing up to the building. Eden took two steps at a time, bursting onto the sidewalk.

She raced towards the huddled figures at the street corner, tried not to look hysterical as to blend in.

“That man—that man was going to shoot us. He wanted my purse and I couldn’t get it open fast enough—but then…” the older woman trailed off in shock.

“Then this guy appeared in all black and saved us!” the little boy took up the story, nodding enthusiastically. “He stopped the bullets.”

“Oh right,” the police officer drawled.

“If only we could all do that,” another officer said, half playfully, half not.

“It was very dark,” the mother said quickly, never letting go of her son. Eden backed away, amazed.

He had saved them. She rushed back to her building, a new hope in her heart. This was wonderful! On the stairwell, second floor, she saw him.

On the top of the stairs, a figure dressed in black. It—he was looking at her with a tilted head, his face obscured by a hat.

“Gabriel?” she asked, approaching slowly. He didn’t stand like himself—good god, there was nothing left of Gabriel Gray. But that was a stupid, impossible thought. “Is that you?”

The tall shadow, only illuminated in red, turned and walked away. More like swaggered away. That confirmed her suspicions. Eden ran after him, darting down the hallway past the remaining tenants, and hurried into her apartment.

She expected to see him.

But there was no one here with her. There would be soon. She sat down to wait for him because surely…he’d be coming to see her. He had to be coming to see her.

(only her)

In her fervor, she didn’t hear Doctor Suresh’s door open and close.

***

“I’ve never seen anything like this in my years of working this division.”

Eden stared at the twisted remains of the taxi. It didn’t seem real. The top half was torn clean open, the jagged parts looking like hands reaching for the sky. Like claws.

Blood had saturated the front seat, making the material stiffen.

“But when you I.D’d the body—there was no doubt in your mind that that was Doctor Suresh?”

Eden shook her head, her head full of nothing. Of ice. Of numbness. She wished she could cry.

It would prove to her that she had loved him in her way. That the connection had been real.

Crycrycry…She detoured into a woman's restroom on the street, stared into the mirror.

"Cry," she ordered herself. Ordered.

Nothing.

She walked home. Waited by the phone.

The call came. She answered. He didn’t say a word.

In the extended silence, she thought she heard grief. Or felt it. She didn’t want to acknowledge that from his side. Not from a thing like him. He didn't try and hide it: not because he had made the ruins of the car throw blame away from anything human... because he knew she'd never tell.

In that, he intuited this correctly.

“He betrayed me. Abandoned me. He'd have done it to others. You. There was nothing in my actions that were abo-”

The sound of his voice was the spark that burnt the dam to the ground.

“How could you do that!?” Eden screamed, lashed out, and felt something snap behind her eyes. She had jumped to her feet, her anger pouring out of her. “How?! You piece of shit! YOU MURDERING-.”

“As expected,” he said, calmly. To her rage…sadly too. He dared…

She took in a wet breath to give the command that would travel through the wires and stop his heart.

He hung up before she could get out a syllable.

***

“I killed him,” Eden said. The park bench was cold, unforgivable.

The rain had come down for days and had just stopped. The world moved on regardless.

“No. You did your best to protect him. I didn’t think he’d come back there…it’s like he couldn’t stay away, huh?”

Bennet was looking for a weakness. Eden could never tell him, ever. She as good as killed Suresh by calling Sylar—as she had found out was his name now. He had been testing her. Oh, he would have killed Suresh. For the ‘betrayal’.

She had made it worse. He had built up the last dregs of her hope before destroying it utterly.

But Eden had learned a final lesson. There was only good and only bad. She was bad. That she knew now. Bad in the hands of good. Gabriel had been right about one thing though: Bennet was using her.

She’d never be a daughter to him, like she would have never been a daughter to Suresh.

But let him use her. It’s what she deserved. She learned there was no saving some people. She had the power to stop them—him—and she would.

This was all she was capable of doing. It was easier to fall than keep afloat when the world gives you every ill imaginable. It took a certain character to avoid it, and with how she was feeling, she didn't have it.

Sylar didn't either. Not so special.

“We’ll get him,” Bennet said, looking haunted. Eden didn’t care to find out why. All that mattered was:

“Yes, we will.”

And they did. She had dispatched him and made his proud self crumble to the ground like a doll.

“No kill,” Bennet reminded them on the phone. “I want this one brought in alive.”

Near the football field, under the lights where good people really lived, she thought this was a mistake. Bennet though…she had kept terrible things from him. She needed to pay her debts.

“One more command?” she asked the Haitian, and after studying her carefully, he nodded.

There Gabriel was, sprawled out at her feet on the grass. Unconscious, he wasn’t much of a Sylar. She knelt down and felt her heart twist.

She could save him. Like before, she could just say ‘Don’t kill’. Be done with it. He wouldn’t ever stop, not really. She could kill him, too. That wasn’t enough.

Eden had read his file now. Over and over again. She wanted him to kill himself: as he was ‘raised’ a Catholic, he’d know what she intended for him in the afterlife. It seemed to be the one choice of his she truly agreed with. She'd give him what he had wanted: that little push necessary.

But the Haitian was watching.

She leaned closer and brushed her lips against his ear.

“The Bennet girl. Claire Bennet. You don’t want to hurt her. You don’t want to kill her. You want to protect her…do not kill her.”

Gabriel’s brow furrowed, his face darkened—and then he was gone again, thrown under consciousness.

She stood up, wiping her hands on her jacket. The Haitian stared at her.

“If he finds her. Which he won’t,” Eden said.

In the end, even if it had to be forced, she had wanted to do some good too.


End file.
